Some brethren understand the scriptures to say that the Old Covenant ended at the cross. After all, Colossians 2:14 does tell us “He has taken it out of the way, having nailed it to the cross.” That seems final enough, and even in another letter Paul added, “by abolishing in His flesh the enmity, which is the Law of commandments contained in ordinances…” (Ephesians 2:15). Yet, if this is so, and the Apostles preached it, wouldn’t they have been excommunicated from Jewish society, and, if they preached against the Temple sacrifices and against Temple worship, why would the Jewish authorities permit them to do it in the Temple (Acts 2:46; 5:42)? If they preached against the Temple, why would they have been found in the Temple worshiping (Acts 3:1; 22:17)? Read the rest of this entry »

Have you ever wondered what life would have been like had the Jews not rejected Jesus? For example, would there be a need for a Second Coming? Would Christ, today, be reigning out of Jerusalem, and would the world be at peace? This seems to be the position taken by the dispensationalists, because they expect Christ to return sometime in the future and do exactly that. In fact, according to the father of modern Dispensationalism, John Darby, the Cross was the work of Satan. Read the rest of this entry »

Sometime after leaving the home of the chief Pharisee, Luke tells us that a multitude followed Jesus (Luke 14:25). Jesus stopped and turned to them and said that anyone who doesn’t hate his father, mother, wife, children, brothers and sisters cannot be his disciple. In other words, Jesus claimed that a disciple’s relationship with Jesus must come before any other close relationship, even one’s family (Luke 14:26). Does Jesus really intend that we actually despise our families so that we can follow him? No, this is not his intended meaning, because, if that were true, it would contradict other places of scripture, where we are told to love our parents, our wives, our children and our brothers and sisters. Read the rest of this entry »

The context seems to indicate that Jesus brought only the Twelve with him when he went up to Caesarea Philippi (Luke 9:18; cf. John 6:66-68). It seems the disciples still needed some R&R due to their preaching mission (Luke 9:1-2), which they didn’t receive when the crowds followed them into the wilderness area near Bethsaida. Furthermore, since Caesarea Philippi could be considered pagan territory, it wasn’t likely that anyone would follow Jesus there but the Twelve. Read the rest of this entry »

In his book, The God Delusion, Richard Dawkins has described the Atonement:

“I have described atonement, the central doctrine of Christianity, as vicious, sado-masochistic and repellent. We should also dismiss it as barking mad, but for its ubiquitous familiarity which has dulled our objectivity. If God wanted to forgive our sins, why not just forgive them, without having himself tortured and executed in payment…”[1]

What can be said of this? Well, first of all, it seems that Dr. Dawkins has misunderstood the doctrine of Atonement. While it may be true that our sins can be forgiven outright, this doesn’t tell the whole story. Read the rest of this entry »

When speaking about the Big Bang Theory, physicist and cosmologist, Alan Guth, described the expanding universe as “the ultimate free lunch.”[1] That idea is very appealing. Nearly everyone likes to get something for free or next to it. For example, how many of us have ever entered free contests to receive a prize, whereby all we have to do is give our names and wait for someone to randomly pick the winner out of jar full of slips of paper, so we can take home our booty? Read the rest of this entry »

Luke records for us in Acts 13:1 the names of five church leaders at Antioch, saying: “Now there were in the church that was at Antioch certain prophets and teachers; as Barnabas, and Simeon that was called Niger, and Lucius of Cyrene, and Manaen, which had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch, and Saul.” Who are these people? Luke simply mentions their names. We know a little about Barnabas, but I’ll deal with him at length in another blog. We know who Saul is, and I have already written about Lucius of Cyrene HERE, but who are Simeon, called Niger, and Manaen, who had been brought up with Herod the tetrarch? Can we know? Read the rest of this entry »